Emigration Course

Tips on the Interview Process

Jeannette M. Wing
9 February 1996 7 February 1997 30 January 1998 4 December 1998 18 February 2000 7 December 2001

Why I Am Giving This Talk

To help you. To help CMU SCS and me. You represent not just you, but also your advisor, CSD, SCS, and CMU. You are our ambassadors.

Dont blow it.

Tips on the Job Interview

Jeannette M. Wing

Outline
Pre-Interview The Interview
General Dos and Donts Typical Structure The Job Talk 1-on-1 Department Head General Things to Keep in Mind

Post-Interview

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Jeannette M. Wing

Assumptions
Youve sent your packet out. Youve gotten a phone call inviting you to visit. Youre sincerely interested in the place.
Dont waste your time if youre not. Dont waste their time if youre not.

Tips on the Job Interview

Jeannette M. Wing

Pre-Interview: Dos and Donts

Do your homework. Practice your job talk (at least) twice. Make up a list of questions to ask (more later). Be prepared.
To explain your work to different audiences (more later). To answer some tough questions from them (more later).

Bring a notebook (paper or electronic). Pack some presentable clothes and shoes you feel comfortable walking and talking in. Think about the location of the place.

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Jeannette M. Wing

Do Your Homework
GOAL: Know your audience.
Find out
Strengths and weaknesses of the place Whos on the faculty/research staff, especially the bigwigs, major players, eccentrics, difficult ones How big (number of people) the place is A bit about the places organization School: private vs. public, dept/school/univ relationship Lab: How broad and deep is the hierarchy? Matrix? Your advisor Other faculty or people who went to school there, taught or worked there before coming to CMU Fellow students who have visited there Friends of above WWW Glossy brochures

From

Tips on the Job Interview

Jeannette M. Wing

Practice Your Job Talk

Practice, but dont over practice.
First time: It will be the worst talk you ever gave and ever will give in your entire life. (Get some friends to play the role of known difficult people.) Second time: It will be pretty good. Third time: It will be great. Nth time: It will bore you and the audience.

Number your slides. Bring backup hardcopy of your slides. Bring blank slides and pens. The talk itself (more later)

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Jeannette M. Wing

The Interview: General Dos and Donts

Be yourself.

quiet shy reserved

arrogant haughty obnoxious

Mind your manners.

Be polite Be respectful Dont offend Dont be (unnecessarily) argumentative. If you disagree with someone, turn it into a fun technical debate, not a religious argument.

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Jeannette M. Wing

More General Dos and Donts

Show conviction, passion about something. Have an inner voice, a rudder that steers you. Know yourself. Show an interest in what people are saying, but
Dont try too hard to please. Dont be too agreeable. Dont be spineless. Stand up for what you believe in.

Listen carefully to what people are asking or saying before answering questions or responding to comments. Dont say anything stupid.
If you dont know anything about something dont pretend that you do. Dont be glib, especially with people you dont know.

Keep detailed notes (people names, impressions, etc.). Dress neatly.

Tips on the Job Interview

Jeannette M. Wing

Structure
A typical two-day interview: Arrive the night before. Dinner maybe. Day 1 Breakfast 1-on-1s (30-60 minutes each) Talk Lunch 1-on-1s Dinner Collapse Day 2: Repeat Day 1 minus talk, maybe minus dinner. Somewhere in there: Tour of department (offices, labs, etc.) Talk with department head 15-30 minutes private time to gather thoughts, go to bathroom Jot down notes (before you go to bed)

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The Job Talk

Two main purposes
To sell yourself (sales talk). To sell your research (technical talk).

There are different audiences in the same room.

1-2 experts, people who know what youre talking about. Everyone else.
Faculty/researchers in a tangentially-related field. (How can your work help me?) Faculty/researchers outside of your field. (Do you sound like you know what youre talking about? Does your research problem sound interesting, worth solving?) Faculty/researchers who are known to be difficult. Graduate students (Watch out for some of them!) People out of touch with research, e.g., (some) administrators, old fogies.

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The Job Talk

I assume you know some general-rules-of-thumb about

Giving a talk. Making slides.
Olivier Danvys Talk on Talks

so what follows are just some reminders

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The Talk Itself

Memorize The first couple of sentences Transition sentences (between slides) Dense sentences (e.g., with tricky definitions of highly technical terms) Catchy phrases Before the talk Look at the audience. Take a deep breath. Relax. (Smile!) During the talk Use eye contact. Pay attention to pace. Pace yourself. You set the pace. Its your talk. You are in control. Use pauses to your advantage. Use feedback: head-nodders, puzzled expressions, blank stares. At the end of the talk Say Thank you (or something that indicates youre done). After the talk (or later that night) Make minor adjustments to slides, order of slides, etc. Jot down reminders on the Notes Page

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Dividing Up Your 60-Minute Slot

First 15 minutes
Motivate the problem you were trying to solve. Clearly and succinctly (for a general audience) state the problem and explain your solution or approach. You need to convince everyone that what you did is interesting and worth their time listening to. Start diving into technical talk. The technical talk. Go into enough detail so that the experts can follow everything you say and are absolutely convinced that youve done good, solid work. You may lose the rest of your audience, but they should still be able to make sense of your high-level arguments. Also you want to impress them with something that they dont understand. Begin wrapping up. Related work: Be scholarly. Explain how your work relates. Whats new? Whats different? Dont just give laundry lists. Conclusions, future work
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Next 2 minutes

Next 20 minutes

Next 3 minutes

Next 5-7 minutes

Last 3-5 minutes

Tips on the Job Interview

Dividing Up Your 60-Minute Slot

Leave time for 5-10 minutes worth of questions interspersed or at the end. Have backup slides for anticipated questions, further details about tricky or interesting technical points.

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Multiple Talks
Have multiple versions of the talk in your head, for different audiences and different durations.
The one-hour job talk version. The technical one-on-one version. The dean/department head version. The elevator version(s)
The waiting for the Wean Hall elevator version. The ride up/down the elevator version.

Refresh your job talk from time to time. Its going to get stale.

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1-on-1: Questions You Might Be Asked

Easy Why did you do what you did for your thesis research? Why did you use your approach and not something else or someone elses? Know the assumptions and limitations of your approach and solution. Whats so interesting about your thesis research? Whats novel about your contribution? Why should I be interested in the problem or solution? Whats the key insight to your solution? Your secret weapon? What are the one or two most significant contributions you feel you have made to the field, to Computer Science? What difference is your solution or approach going to make to someone who is outside of your field? Tougher What do you want to do next? What do you see yourself doing in three, five years? Where do you see the field being in five years? Ten? What are you going to do that will help us get there? What do you think are the top two or three problems in Computer Science? What are you going to do that will help us solve them? What do you think is the most significant advance in Computer Science (or in your field) in the past year? Past two-three years? Do you know anything about X? (Be careful!) What do you think of X? (Be careful!)
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1-on-1: Questions to Ask

Definitely
What research are you doing? (Get a feel for how ambitious a research project can be at this place; the scope of research activity at this place; whether theres anything going on of interest to you; potential collaborator?) Do you have any students? What are they doing? Do you collaborate with anyone? What are you doing together? Is collaboration encouraged? How is your research funded? What courses are you teaching? What are the students (undergraduate, Masters, Ph.D.) like? What do you perceive the strengths and weaknesses of this place to be? Do you like it here?

Maybe Are you happy?

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With the Department Head (or Dean)

Statistics, financial matters, and procedures. Find out about
Facts about the place Evaluation and promotion processes How faculty are funded for research Any special research support for junior faculty Role of junior faculty in getting research money (NSF, DARPA) View on collaboration Teaching load Computing facilities support: who buys, who maintains Benefits (health, dental, retirement, tuition exemption, etc.)

With respect to you:

How are hiring decisions made? (So you know when to expect to hear from someone.)

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Ask Host or Anyone When Appropriate

Find out about
Getting students, quality of students, support for students. Educational programs at all degree levels (B.S., Masters, and Ph.D.). Expectations of junior faculty or junior member of research staff.

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Meals
If you have any dietary restrictions, speak up. Mind your table manners. Relax, be yourself, but dont get drunk. Be prepared to talk shop. Some faculty/researchers will be able to talk to you only during a meal; they might miss your job talk. (And, some just might like to grill you to wear you out!) Its a good time to bring up social issues, e.g.,
life on campus, life in town/city, housing, schools for kids, two-body situation, outside interests But dont ask about these too much unless
you get the sense that they really want you, or you cant live without something or without being able to do X.

Its a good time to hear the real scoop on a place.

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Time Leftover?
Ask to talk to some graduate students. Get an informal tour of campus, neighborhoods where you might live, town or city. (Show an interest in your surroundings.)

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What They Are Looking For

Theory vs. Practice Are you a theoretician, a systems person, a bridge person? Do you prove theorems or build systems? Are you an applications builder? Creativity Are you full of ideas, an innovator, a visionary? Are you a thinker? Are you an incrementalist, an integrator? Are you a clone of your advisor? Independence Are you an independent thinker? How well do you work on your own and with others? Brainpower Are you smart? Are you a clever problem solver? Technical skills and ability Are you an engineer, a technician? Are you a detail person, a techie, a hacker? Can you program? Can you do math?

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What They Are Looking For

Energy Are you a go-getter? Will you make things happen? Leadership Will you start new initiatives? Will you inspire those around you? Articulate How well do you express yourself orally and in writing? Teaching Can you teach? What can you teach? Fitting In Do you complement interests of current faculty/research staff? Do you fill in a hole or overlap? Does your personality mesh well with the place? Would you make a good colleague? Are you a superstar? NSF CAREER Award material? ACM Dissertation Award material? Future Turing Award winner?

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What You Should Look For

Research Is there any interesting research going on there? Can you imagine doing the kind of research youd like to do there? Is there someone with whom you can have a deep technical talk? Colleagues Number and quality: How many are there? Are any of them any good? How good is their best? Are you smarter than all of them? Do you like the people? Is there a potential buddy? Students (at all levels) Number and quality: How many are there? Are any of them any good? How good is their best? Are you smarter than all of them? Where are they from? Mostly foreign or domestic? Where did their graduate students get their undergraduate degrees from? Where do their graduates go? Industry? Academia (top schools?)? Teaching Are there courses you would enjoy teaching? Is there flexibility in choosing what to teach? Is the teaching load acceptable? Flexible? Can you buy out of teaching?
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Tips on the Job Interview

What You Should Look For

Management Do you get along with the department head? Can you imagine working within the department/research labs organizational structure? Location Can you imagine yourself living near there? Think of your day-to-day life, more than where youd like to spend your vacations.

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Post-Interview
Keep in touch with your host or department head. The chance to write a formal thank you is in the cover letter when sending back your receipts for a reimbursement check. Use peoples names. Dont pester people about status, but dont let too much time go by. (Show that youre still interested, a live candidate.)

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Congratulations!
You got an offer
You may request a second visit. Maybe to bring an SO/spouse to see the place, city, etc. Dont be ridiculous in your requests, especially what you want to put in your offer letter. It comes off sounding petty. Do get in writing Starting salary Starting date (this is when your tenure clock starts and sometimes affects when benefits kick in) Support for computing and networking facilities (for office, home, traveling; to start up a lab) Support for summer(s) (how many months for how many years) Support for students (how many for how long) Support for moving expenses Release from any teaching responsibilities (how many semesters) Any special deals, e.g., using your n years of post-doc, industrial experience, etc. towards your tenure clock

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Congratulations!
Ask about, and maybe get in writing if you sense you need to Secretarial support Policy about if you havent finished your thesis after you start Dont ask (now) about support for telephones, the size, location, or paint color of your office with a window, a room with a view, office supplies, parking, etc. You will sound silly. You may ask later, when it is more appropriate. Negotiate as high a starting salary as possible. Subsequent raises are percentage increases.

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Remember
Whether you get an offer or not, You have made new, important contacts for the future. You have represented Carnegie Mellon and your advisor. Whatever impression you gave them is a direct reflection of the Carnegie Mellon University and your Ph.D. program. (Dont embarrass us!)

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Finally
Be yourself. Mind your manners. Enjoy it!

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